Girls at risk Hack – request for ideas

March 21, 2013

I got a request from friends in Freeformers.com. They are doing a tech-jam next Tuesday building an app for girls and women in abusive relationships. I’ve been asked if my friends in tech here in Northern Ireland and beyond can help. If you have any tips or ideas on APIs and Apps that might help, please drop Cassandra Harris <cassandra@freeformers.com> an email. Thanks. Here is Cassandra’s ask.

Did you know that in Britain 1 woman is killed every 3 days by a partner or former partner, Domestic violence is 25% of all reported crime, a woman is assaulted an average of 35 times before she reports it!!

We are running a Girls at Risk hack on Tuesday up in Bristol to help a group of girls, who have been in abusive relationships, some have even been in prison, to learn how to make an app in a day and also brainstorm around an app which we could develop for other girls like them out there, suffering from abusive relationships.

We need a little more clarity around existing apps that might be good best practice examples to bring up during the hack. Apps or APIs which address the following:

Encryption and safety (any good apps or APIs out there??) – they wouldn’t want their abusive partners to see an app like this on their phone, is there a way to disguise it? e.g. Snapchat has a time limit on how long shared pictures can be displayed for before disappearing off the users device.

Helping them to build friendships with others who have experienced similar circumstances – an example is Circle of 6 (an app which already exists) – linking the user to 6 of their closest friends which will support them in need

Support link features – enabling them to contact someone who can help during times of need.